


Girlfriend Material

by TheIcyQueen



Category: Until Dawn (Video Game)
Genre: Cutesy, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Humor, Glasses, Kissing, Prompt Fill, Schmoop, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-09
Updated: 2020-11-09
Packaged: 2021-03-09 05:08:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,159
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27479320
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheIcyQueen/pseuds/TheIcyQueen
Summary: As anyone who's ever had to wear glasses knows, there are few things on this planet more infuriating, more rage-inducing, more absolutely night-ruining than one of your stupid friends getting their fingerprints all over your glasses. Smudges, smears...none of it makes for an enjoyable experience. But the worst - oh, the WORST - is trying to find something made of the right fabric to actually get them CLEAN again.Lucky for Chris, Ashley always comes prepared.
Relationships: Ashley Brown/Chris Hartley
Comments: 8
Kudos: 23





	Girlfriend Material

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ElliePollie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElliePollie/gifts).



> Hello my friends!!! Another piece that might seem familiar to you if you follow me on tumblr!! This year being...what it is...I'm slowly but surely putting some of my (previously) tumblr-only stuff up here as well, so hopefully you enjoyed it enough the first time around to give it another go ;P Hehehe.

“Was that really necessary? I mean, honestly? _Honestly?_ ” Scowling, Chris pulled his glasses off and held them up to the light just long enough to see what kind of damage had been done.

A lot. The answer was _a lot_.

“Who does that? Who just puts their greasy hands—”

“Um, excuse me? You oughta be more careful, Cochise, you might hurt my itty bitty feelings.”

“You have known me,” Chris began again, sliding his glasses back on before fixing Josh with an exhausted glare, “For _my whole life_ , you freaking troglodyte! When has it _ever_ been cool to just put your grabby mitts all over my glasses?”

Josh rolled his eyes, snickering all the while. “You’re acting like I dunked them in a toilet. Just wipe ‘em off on your shirt, stop being a baby—”

“Hey, not for nothing, but…I think everyone in this room has a _fairly_ decent idea of where your hands have been, so...” Sam held her hands up at her shoulders when Josh turned to her, but she did nothing to mask her grin, “I’m just saying! I probably wouldn’t be too happy if I had to walk around with your particular brand of residue on full display in front of my eyes all day either.”

“W-wipe it on _my shirt?_ Do you have any idea—”

“Wow Sammy. Nice. Y’know, I was sort of under the impression you were supposed to be the _nice_ one in this little happy family of ours, so I’m not sure I appreciate you coming out of the woodwork with these scorching zingers all of a sudden.”

“Uh huh. Well sorry if I’m messing with the group dynamic.”

“You are! You are though, you’re totally throwing it all off.”

Knowing his court-appointed moment to air his grievances had officially passed, Chris made a low noise of frustration, already working on making his way through the mental shift that came with smudged glasses. Of _course_ none of the others gave a shit—none of _them_ had to deal with this, none of _them_ understood the endless cycle of pointless work that went into living behind dirty lenses or the sheer _force of will_ that was required to make it through an entire evening out knowing there was no hope of seeing anything without streaks or smears or—

“Here.”

He shook himself out of his quiet pity party to see Ashley had plunked herself down on the couch next to him, holding one of her hands out. “Here what?”

She laughed, “Here, as in, here, give me your glasses. I’m pretty sure my hoodie’s the right fabric.”

“The rig—Ash, I have like, five different cleaning cloths at home and none of _them_ are the right fabric, so I appreciate the check you’re trying to write, okay—I do—but it _is_ going to bounce, so…”

“Oh my God.” Before he could say anything else, she reached up to his face and took his glasses, quickly angling her shoulders away so he wouldn’t be able to fight her on it.

Not that he was capable of doing that. Not that he was capable of even _considering_ it. Oh no, not when her hands had been that close to his face, her fingers just barely brushing against his cheeks before she plucked his frames from off of his ears.

Being as subtle as his admittedly awkward… _everything_ would allow, he mimicked her posture, turning juuust a bit away from her. Would it help? Doubtful. Would she still be able to see the tips of his ears going red? No question. But old habits died hard, and while he wasn’t sure embarrassment was a habit, per se, it was definitely an old friend in that regard. “You really don’t have to do that.”

The noise she made was equal parts laugh and groan as she pulled her legs up onto the couch to sit cross-legged beside him, one of her sleeves rolled up over her hand as she fastidiously polished his glasses. “Chris,” she said in the way she reserved for special occasions (read: when he was acting particularly ridiculous), the way that almost made his name sound like ‘Cress,’ “You’re not gonna be able to see anything through these.”

“They’re…” Ah, but she had him, didn’t she? Yeah, he’d already bitched about it, so there was no use trying to pretend he hadn’t. “Th-they’re not _that_ bad.”

Her eyes rolled up to him from her lap, and while his plan had been to keep from looking directly at her until he could get the color of his face under control, the movement in his periphery made him turn back all the same. Not having his glasses on helped things a little…from that distance, she was more color and shape than actual human being. Still, years of friendship had primed him to feel the judgment in her gaze even so.

“They’re _not_ ,” he insisted.

Instead of answering right away, Ashley went and popped his glasses onto her own face, pushing them up the bridge of her nose with one finger. She leaned in closer, just a bit, so there’d be no question that he’d be able to see her. The frames definitely didn’t quite fit her face, the shape was all wrong, and the overall effect was vaguely schoolmarm-ish…

But—as with most things about Ashley—not entirely unappealing.

“They’re disgusting,” she said flatly, blinking at him once before pulling them off again, returning to polishing them with her sleeve. “And you _know_ Josh is gonna wanna watch that awful movie tonight—” She paused, and even blurry as she was, Chris thought she’d turned to see whether Josh would shoot back some sort of snappy comeback; he must have been too invested in his conversation with Sam, though, because a second later Ashley was back to work, continuing to talk under her breath. “And _God forbid_ you’re too distracted by like, weird lighting streaks and stuff to listen to him ooh and ahh over how brilliant so-and-so was for choosing to use, like…real human bones instead of plaster, or whatever…”

“God forbid,” he echoed, trying to keep his voice light to make up for the stupid fluttering in his stomach.

Okay, yeah, sure, fine, so she’d had pretty much the same thought as him without him having to say it, that was true. But that didn’t mean he had to get all… _gooey_ about it. That was incredibly dumb. Incredibly, unbelievably, sappily, crappily dumb, and—

Yeah, she was looking at him. Okay.

Chris cleared his throat and assumed as neutral a face as he was humanly capable of. That probably wasn’t saying a whole lot, but he _tried_. “What?”

“Nothing,” Ashley said, shaking her head with a quiet laugh. She lifted his glasses to the light, cocked her head to the side, and then went back to cleaning them. “I guess I just like, haven’t seen you _not_ in your glasses forever, that’s all. You live in these things.”

“Uh, well yeah, Ash, I kinda need them. Y’know. For the whole ‘seeing’ thing.” Just not right at that moment. Right at that moment, he was perfectly content to have them off and away, leaving his vision a blurry, myopic mess. There was no _way_ he would’ve been able to pull off sounding that casual if he’d been able to actually _see_ her. “The good Lord above knew that with my charisma, sense of humor, and raw animal magnetism, I’d just be too powerful without an impairment or two, so…”

Though he couldn’t see it, he heard the curve of her smile in her words, and it made the fluttering in his stomach and chest that much more noticeable. “Oh, is _that_ what it is?”

“Mhm.”

“I was wondering about that.”

“Glad I could clear it up for you.”

On the other side of the room, Sam and Josh continued to laugh about…whatever it was they were laughing about, their conversation made indistinct by Ashley’s continued closeness. After another minute or two, she held the glasses up, no doubt checking her work again. “Okay, I think…here, try this.”

Now, if he had to tell the truth, he didn’t have high hopes. Just because it was Ash doing the polishing didn’t mean he had _any_ sort of faith in it being done the right way. She’d probably do a _passable_ job—she was nothing if not a perfectionist, that Ashley Brown—but there were so many _angles_ you had to check when cleaning your glasses, so many ways you had to twist to see if maybe you missed a spot, or if there’d be any weird streaking along the edge, or any number of other endlessly annoying things…

And the second he put them on, he found he had to eat all those doubts. “Oh holy shit, Ash…this is…great?” He hadn’t meant for the question mark to happen. No, he hadn’t intended on that valley girl brand of upward inflection at the end of the sentence, but being able to see again meant being able to _see_ again (surprise surprise), and wow, she was…real close.

“Yeah?” she asked, beaming proudly. “You’re not just like, saying that to make me feel like I did a good job, right?”

“I’m absolutely not, this is…for real? It’s like these puppies are brand new.”

She laughed, still obviously so very, very proud of herself…and then, as was so often the case with the two of them, things got quiet.

The moment, like many such moments before it, was _palpable_. Cut-through-it-with-a-steak-knife palpable. Sitting-at-the-bottom-of-the-deep-end-of-a-pool palpable. So palpable you’d have to eat it with a spoon instead of sipping it through a straw. He had to stop thinking of the word ‘palpable,’ because it _was not helping_. Not with Ashley sitting so close like that, the two of them basically sharing the same couch cushion, her eyes bright with a smile and her hand warm where they hovered a few inches away from his, and, and, and…

In a move he never, _ever_ could’ve predicted, she carefully reached up and gingerly pulled his glasses off again. He could hear the quiet click of her setting them down on the side table, but wasn’t given enough time to wonder what _that_ might’ve meant, because a moment later her palms were cupping his cheeks, warm and smooth except for the tiny silver slivers of her rings, and—oh, okay, well. Huh.

Then she was kissing him.

His first thought was panicked, not sure what to do with (or more specifically, _where to put_ ) his hands, though it had flown out the window a moment later as he leaned into it. His hands found her sides, and though he still wasn’t confident enough in that choice to pull her any closer, she seemed to melt into him all the same, tilting her head in a way that might have given him pause if he’d been wearing his glasses…but he _wasn’t_. She’d made sure of that.

A perfectionist _and_ a schemer, that Ashley Brown.

She pulled away a second later, still close enough for him to _feel_ her smile against his lips, and she was all nervous giggles as she held his face in her hands. “Sorry…” she said, sounding (in his opinion, at least) not sorry in the slightest, “I’ve kinda, um…always wanted to…do that.”

It took him a beat to find his own voice again, but when he did, he was shocked to hear how even it came out. “Understandable. It’s, uh…it’s all that raw animal magnetism I was telling you about.”

Ashley snorted a laugh. Then, less tentatively than before, pressed her lips to his again, her pulse fluttering under his hands and against his cheeks. That second kiss lingered for much longer, neither one of them wanting to be the first to move away. But of course one of them _had_ to—they were hanging out with the others, after all, and…

And it was that precise moment that Chris noticed how very, _very_ quiet the room had gotten.

“Do you want your glasses back?” Ashley asked with another bubbly little laugh, not waiting for his answer as she moved to reach for them.

“Well,” Chris started, “I guess, uh, I guess that depends, Ash. Are Josh and Sam staring?”

He saw her posture change then, and had he been able to see better, he had a solid idea her expression would’ve fallen. She turned over her shoulder to check…and then turned back to him. “Ooh yeah.”

“Yeah, then I’m good, actually. You can just, uh…just leave ‘em on the table. I’m good with being blind for now. Just, uh…” he cleared his throat, “Let me know when they, uh, _stop_.”

“‘Let me know when they stop,’ he says,” Josh drawled from the other side of the room, sounding pleased as punch, “Insinuating _that’s_ ever gonna happen.”

**Author's Note:**

> Per the usual, I really, truly hope all of you are staying safe and healthy out there, and that you and yours are hanging in there during 2020 being...2020. My thoughts are with you guys more than you know - throwing words out into the void is pretty much how I'VE been dealing with this nightmare of a year, and you guys never fail to make me smile even when I'm feelin' particularly blue, so...thanks! ;P
> 
> (And while I know MOST of y'all are familiar with my tumblr, just a quick reminder you can find me there as queenofbaws - just in case you've ever wondered how to potentially get a prompt fill of your very own, haha!!)


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